Doing the Business Tasks I've Put Off All Year, and What They're Teaching Me

The theme for December is Doing the Things I Said I’d Do in 2019 But Haven’t Done Yet. I don't know how to end procrastination once and for all, but I have learned some ways to combat it.

Last week I talked about writing each month’s newsletters all at once (batching the work), and how successful that’s been so far.

This week’s challenge is to look at the people who are actually opening and reading my newsletters, and interacting with them. I use MailChimp. I switched from Constant Contact because MailChimp was less expensive, which is no longer true. They’re both about the same.

In the software application world, the expense isn’t the software. It’s the time it takes you to learn it. If you know Constant Contact already, stick with it. Same with MailChimp. One key, I think, in ending procrastination, is not putting big hurdles in your way when you're trying to get work done.

I procrastinated looking at the numbers. There’s a part of me that absolutely does not want to know how many people are opening and reading the newsletters.

That part says, “Writing them and getting them out on time is ENOUGH!!” 

But I promised. So I did it. Here’s what I learned.

1. My open rate (number of people who read the newsletter) is between 32-50%. That’s decent. I didn’t feel too bad looking at that number. It’s trending down, but that’s sort of normal for a newsletter that comes out every week. I’ll have to keep checking to make sure the open rate stabilizes.
2. Many, but not all of the people who read it consistently are personal friends and acquaintances.
3. I’m not adding more subscribers.

I started comparing myself to some mythical people who only exist in my mind, and to compare is to despair (wish I’d coined that phrase). So I stopped and decided to focus on one factor only, adding new subscribers. This kept me out of overwhelm and paralysis.

Moral of this story:

1. If you don’t want to do something but you know you need to, make a public promise to do it. Very motivating.
2. Refrain from swamping yourself. If more than one thing is broken, choose one to focus on and fix that. It’s much easier and less demoralizing. It’s also a marketing rule. Don’t change more than one thing at a time, or you won’t be able to tell which change made a difference.

Did you promise yourself you’d do some things in 2019 that you didn’t do? Join me! You can hit reply and tell me what you’re working on. Or book a 15-minute chat with me to get yourself unstuck.

Next steps in ending my 2019 procrastination

I’m going to add the people who already told me they wanted to subscribe (yes, this should have been done already. You’re right). Then I’m going to go through my list of contacts and invite the ones I know to subscribe. I have a pop-up on my website for people to sign up also. I’m setting a goal to add 20 new subscribers this month.

Remember—Your work matters. What are your next steps?